1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to methods and systems for delivering notification messages from messaging networks.
2. Description of the Related Art
Home network environments are becoming increasingly prevalent as network-enabled consumer devices proliferate. Examples of the network-enabled consumer devices include personal computers (PCs), personal digital assistants (PDAs), smart telephones, Web tablets or other tablet computers, set-top boxes, and Internet-enabled refrigerators. Each of these devices, at its core, has Internet or Web access in addition to one or more device-specific functions.
A popular application of the Internet is instant messaging (IM). Users receive and send messages to each other using a client application interface. For most popular IM networks (e.g. America Online's AOL Instant Messenger and Microsoft's MSN Instant Messenger), versions of the client software exist for PCs, PDAs, and sometimes for smart telephones.
Instant messaging is currently evolving from basic user-to-user notification to more generalized notification services where back-end services send alert messages to users. For example, an airline may send notification to a user about an arrival or departure status of a particular flight. Another example is a home surveillance camera sending an alert and a Web link to a video clip. A further example is an alert from a Web-based auction site about a competing bid to which a user needs to respond within an hour.
Current client-based IM networks offer limited support for the aforementioned scenarios. First, each of these IM networks requires a proprietary client. Second, the client needs to be available on multiple devices within the user's home. Third, dealing with multiple of these IM networks is a nuisance for an average user. In some cases, the client itself is a gateway to multiple IM networks, but these gateway clients have been limited to a few kinds of devices. Fourth, the user needs to be “logged in” to the network on a particular device and have this device be available to receive the notification. Often, this particular device is a cellular phone which has limited display and processing abilities.